This invention relates to an improvement in the process for producing glass beads described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,843,340 to Eugene J. Cone, entitled "Method and Apparatus for Producing Glass Beads." In that process, glass is melted to a low viscosity and forced through a small-diameter orifice to form a jet which breaks apart into beads as it falls through air. The single jet of glass shown in that patent, however, is greatly limited as to its production rate. It would therefore be desirable to employ a plurality of bead-forming jets on the same melter, thereby improving efficiency and rendering large-scale production more practical. But merely increasing the number of jets gives rise to a number of problems. Because the beads are caught in a quenching fluid while still in a softened condition so as to reduce the drop height to a more manageable distance, increasing the rate of bead formation results in a higher incidence of collisions between the soft beads in the quenching bath, which can cause the beads to be deformed or become adhered together. Also, intensifying the influx of hot beads into a quenching bath can overload the ability of the fluid to dissipate the heat, leading to localized overheating which in turn can cause inclusions of quenching fluid residues within the beads as well as causing loss of fluid by evaporation and ignition.